K-pop stars rise on rigorous training

Social networking services are another factor in Korean bands' success in Europe

이수만 "한국 가요로 세계 대장정 ... 14년 전 꿈 이뤘다"

K-pop fans wait outside Le Zenith de Paris concert hall for the start of the "SM Town Live World Tour" concert on Saturday afternoon in Paris. [YONHAP]

PARIS - The successful debut of five K-pop bands at a concert in Paris over the weekend was fueled by a unique and rigorous system of artist training developed by mega-management agencies such as SM Entertainment, the Korean agency that organized the concert, according to the agency and other sources.

The concert, "SM Town Live World Tour", drew thousands of fans and featured five bands represented by the agency - TVXQ, Girls' Generation, Super Junior, SHINee and f(x). It was held at Le Zenith de Paris concert hall on Friday and Saturday.

An article in the French daily newspaper Le Monde on Friday said that Korean pop culture is spreading in Europe even without the help of advertising thanks to video sharing services such as YouTube and social networking services such as Facebook and Twitter.

The article focused on describing the system developed by Korean entertainment agencies to nurture new singers and said it was also a major factor in the bands' popularity. The system has artists learning singing, dancing and even foreign languages over a period of several years.

The training system originated with SM Entertainment and Lee Soo-man, its founder and chairman. Lee is the person who came up with the idea of molding singers into well-designed products.

Lee Soo-man, chairman of SM Entertainment, talks about the steps he is taking to bring K-pop to Europe in a meeting with 70 European composers and producers in Paris on Saturday. [YONHAP]

He explained the system at a conference on Saturday with more than 70 composers and producers at a Paris hotel.

"The methods that we use when selecting and nurturing aspiring singers into real gems are part of CT", he said, referring to "culture technology", a term he coined. "CT includes not only the broad system itself but also the techniques we use to make music, choreography, music videos, live performances and even the stars' makeup".

Lee said the system started with the boy band H.O.T. in the mid 1990s. Lee picked out five talented young men and gave them intensive training over a two-year period. The five-member group soon became popular in Korea and then in China and Southeast Asia and is remembered as one of Korea's first boy bands. H.O.T. disbanded in the early 2000s.

Lee's next project heated up Japan. The pop star BoA made her debut after a training regime that was more intensive than that for H.O.T. Under Lee's training regime, BoA learned a variety of foreign languages before making her successful debut in Japan in 2005. BoA attracted the interest of the Japanese public even before the TV drama "Winter Sonata" starring Bae Yong-joon helped launch the Korean Wave in that country in 2002.

In an interview with the Joongang Ilbo directly after BoA's debut in Japan in 2005, Lee said he always focuses on three things when selecting and nurturing new singers - the ability to sing, play or compose good music, the ability to dance and the ability to learn foreign languages.

Good looks are almost certainly another factor.

"K-pop seems to attract Europeans because of the singers' and bands' music and their ability to dance, which may even be stronger than the music, as well as their excellent physical appearance", Kim Young-min, SM Entertainment's CEO, said in an interview in Paris on Thursday.

Lee's latest products are the five groups that performed in the "SM Town Live World Tour" concert in the French capital last weekend.

Lee is also making an effort to improve the quality of the music to attract a global audience by employing European songwriters.

He said at the conference on Saturday that he is increasing cooperation with composers and other artists in other countries to produce Korean Wave products and that development would occur in three stages.

"The first stage is the export of Hallyu [Korean Wave] products made in Korea", he said. "This is being followed by collaboration with foreign entertainment companies to increase our presence in foreign markets. The third stage is to set up joint ventures with foreign companies and pass Korean CT to the locals so that a localized Hallyu can eventually be made".

Also participating in the conference was American record producer Teddy Riley, who has worked with Michael Jackson and other top artists. He described K-pop as more than music, but a movement in which people can participate.

Kim, the SM Entertainment CEO, spoke about the reason why Paris was chosen as the venue for their first concert in Europe.

"The European center for pop music is regarded as Germany, he said. "but after reconsidering France's cultural significance, we decided Paris would be where we held our first concert in Europe".

Responding to questions about whether the K-pop concert would become an annual event, Kim expressed some doubt.

"But if this concert goes well, we hope to add European countries to our list of countries for a world tour, perhaps every other year".

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